this into the context not just of africa but of the broader fight against al qaeda, because president obama has often said that al qaeda is on its way to defeat and it's probably true that the central al qaeda ornization which was one headed by osama bin laden and headquartered in pakistan probably matter a lot less now than a few years ago but what you have seen is that as we pit al qaeda in the core area in afghanistan and pakistan it splintered outward and moved outward. and now are you seeing, you know, like a virus trying to find a body in which it can find a weak host. it's moving out and becoming more powerful in places like yemen, somalia, libya, now mali. so it's moving further and further a field and there are so many weak states because this is where terrorists te rt. they take root in failed states there are so many failed states in africa it is not just mali there are a lot of other places and now increasingly in north africa too because of the upheavals that we've seen in the last several years. there's very weak states that cannot resist the incursions of these islamist terro